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Groklaw Examines Microsoft's Promises

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the tired-of-shoveling-it-yet dept.

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "Groklaw has examined that 'new leaf' Microsoft turned the other day. PJ has a lengthy analysis of Microsoft's latest promises. To make a long story short, the promises are more of the same stuff and don't help anyone but Microsoft. They only protect 'noncommercial' development and are set up to create a patented standards toll road so that Microsoft can charge competitors to compete. As PJ puts it, 'This is a promise to remain incompatible with the GPL, as far as I can make out.'"

5 of 125 comments (clear)

  1. Hear All About It by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    So Groklaw has discovered the truth that Microsoft didn't announce that they're going to give everything away for free? Holyshit you could knock me over with a feather.

    Groklaw wouldn't be happy unless Microsoft announced that it was filing for bankruptcy and submitting everything they own into the public domain, and even then they've bitch that MS didn't license under the GPL.

  2. In other words... it;'s a net positive? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    'This is a promise to remain incompatible with the GPL, as far as I can make out.'

    So in other words, it's good for business- and commerical-focused software, and bad for Richard Stallman and his grand scheme to tell us what software we are allowed to use?

    Sounds good to me. Where do I sign up?
  3. Which "Qualifications" is PJ using this time? by ClosedSource · · Score: -1, Troll

    Is PJ writing this based on her expertise as a non-lawyer or her expertise as a non-programmer?

  4. the emperor has no clothes by nguy · · Score: 0, Troll

    Microsoft may brag about their "intellectual property" and put in language like "licensed for non-commercial distribution", but what rights to they actually have? Does anybody seriously think that they have enforceable patents on the binary MS Office format? On OOXML? On the C# language or their half-hearted Java API clones? What kinds of damage claims could they possibly make if people built more interoperable tools? "Judge, our business has been seriously damaged because we have been prevented from monopolizing the market with our obsolete and cumbersome technology?"

    Microsoft is in retreat, they just can't get themselves to admit it publicly.

  5. Re:To make a long story short: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

    How about Sun's legal threats against people who innovate on top of Java in unauthorized fashion? How much is M$ paying you for that nice euphemism for "embrace, extend, and extinguish"?

    Because that's all your statement is.